XXXVII.

“Although it was only six o'clock, the night was already dark. The fog, made thicker by its proximity to the Seine, blurred every detail with its ragged veils, punctured at various distances by the reddish glow of lanterns and bars of light escaping from illuminated windows. The road was soaked with rain and glittered under the street-lamps, like a lake reflecting strings of lights. A bitter wind, heavy with icy particles, whipped at my face, its howling forming the high notes of a symphony whose bass was played by swollen waves crashing into the piers of the bridges below. The evening lacked none of winter's rough poetry.” 

~ Théophile Gautier

Hashish, Wine, Opium


Photo credit:  ngm.nationalgeographic

XXXVI.

“Sometimes I don't know, which moment
which cool gust of wind will come,
and enchant me
tousling my hair
and my heart, 

stirring...that familiar ache of poetry, 

which drop will kiss
the old wrench in my soul
reminding me, all over again

I miss you better in the rain.” 

― Sanober Khan, A Thousand Flamingos

XXII.

                

“I wanted so badly to lie down next to her on the couch, to wrap my arms around her and sleep. Not fuck, like in those movies. Not even have sex. Just sleep together, in the most innocent sense of the phrase. But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was hopelessly boring and she was endlessly fascinating. So I walked back to my room and collapsed on the bottom bunk, thinking that if people were rain, I was drizzle and she was a hurricane.” 

– John Green, Looking for Alaska

“Then they went into José Arcadio Buendía’s room, shook him as hard as they could, shouted in his ear, put a mirror in front of his nostrils, but they could not awaken him. A short time later, when the carpenter was taking measurements for the coffin, through the window they saw a light rain of tiny yellow flowers falling. They fell on the town all through the night in a silent storm, and they covered the roofs and blocked the doors and smothered the animals who slept outdoors. So many flowers fell from the sky that in the morning the streets were carpeted with a compact cushion and they had to clear them away with shovels and rakes so that the funeral procession could pass by.” – Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

XVII.

"It is one of the secrets of Nature in its mood of mockery that 

fine weather lays heavier weight on the mind and hearts of the 

depressed and the inwardly tormented than does a really bad day 

with dark rain sniveling continuously and sympathetically from 

a dirty sky."  ~Muriel Spark

"Suddenly all the sky is hid

As with the shutting of a lid,

One by one great drops are falling

Doubtful and slow,

Down the pane they are crookedly crawling,

And the wind breathes low;

Slowly the circles widen on the river,

Widen and mingle, one and all;

Here and there the slenderer flowers shiver,

Struck by an icy rain-drop’s fall."

~James Russell Lowell, "Summer Storm," 1839

XIV.

Strange Days

“There are a hundred things she has tried to chase away the things she won't remember and that she can't even let herself think about because that's when the birds scream and the worms crawl and somewhere in her mind it's always raining a slow and endless drizzle.

You will hear that she has left the country, that there was a gift she wanted you to have, but it is lost before it reaches you. Late one night the telephone will sign, and a voice that might be hers will say something that you cannot interpret before the connection crackles and is broken.

Several years later, from a taxi, you will see someone in a doorway who looks like her, but she will be gone by the time you persuade the driver to stop. You will never see her again. 

Whenever it rains you will think of her. ” 

― Neil Gaiman

XII.

“It was night, and the rain fell; and, falling, it was rain, but, having fallen, it was blood. And I stood in the morass among the tall lilies, and the rain fell upon my head — and the lilies sighed one unto the other in the solemnity of their desolation."

“The rain came down upon my head - Unshelter'd. And the wind rendered me mad and deaf and blind.”

Quotes by Edgar Allen Poe

VIII

There is more to sex appeal than just measurements. 

I don't need a bedroom to prove my womanliness.

 I can convey just as much sex appeal, picking apples

 off a tree or standing in the rain.  ~ Audrey Hepburn

Sense the blessings of the earth in the perfect arc of a 

ripe tangerine, the taste of warm, fresh bread, the 

circling flight of birds, the lavender color of the 

sky shining in a late afternoon rain puddle, the 

million times we pass other beings in our cars 

and shops and out among the trees without 

crashing, conflict, or harm.

~ Jack Kornfield

Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly 

cleanse and cool the earth, the air and you.  ~ Langston Hughes

The three great elemental sounds in nature are 

the sound of rain, the sound of wind in a 

primeval wood, and the sound of outer 

ocean on a beach. ~ Henry Besto

VI.

Red skies at night, sailors delight.

Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning.

A ring around the moon means a storm is coming. Count the stars within the ring and rain will come in that many days.

Moss dry, sunny sky, moss wet, rain you'll get.

Count the seconds between lightning flashes and thunder crashes to tell how far away is the storm.

When leaves show their underside, 
be sure that rain betide.

The sky is red, the devil is dead, 
it's going to be good tomorrow.